The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office today released new estimates on the cost of the president's health care law, revealing a shocking new sticker price of $1.8 trillion.

According to the report, the estimated gross cost of coverage for FY 2012-2021 has increased to $1.48 trillion, which is--"$50 billion higher than last year's projection." Some are already trying to present one side of the report and simply highlight a reduced net cost, but a closer look at CBO's analysis unravels how the Democrats used budget gimmicks to hide the true cost of the health care law. The report continues, "An additional $99 billion in net deficit reduction from penalty payments, the excise tax on high-premium insurance plans, and other effects on tax revenues and outlayswith most of those effects reflecting changes in revenues." Meaning? The individual mandate penalties and taxes on job creators hid the law's $50 billion increase in the gross cost of the coverage.

According to CBO, four million fewer--Americans will receive employer-based insurance, leading "to an increase in estimated revenues because a larger share of total compensation will take the form of taxable wages and salaries and a smaller share will be in the form of nontaxable health benefits."

Despite former Speaker Nancy Pelosi's promise that the health care law would create 4 million jobs, CBO explains one of the reasons for the increase in the cost of coverage is due to the weak economy that continues on the president's watch. The report explains, "the unemployment rate is higher throughout the projection period than it was in last year's forecast. CBO also now estimates that wages and salaries will be lower than it previously anticipated. Those changes yield an increase in the projected number of people eligible for Medicaid and CHIP as a result of the ACA." Since more Americans are unemployed than projected, more people will be forced onto Medicaid. Speaker Pelosi was also right when she said we'd have to pass the bill to find out what was in it.